I'm currently working through Lingua Latina Pars II, and yesterday I was telling a friend of mine how amazing it is to be forced to think in Latin for the hour or so per day I spend reading the book. My friend was intrigued by the Ã˜rberg method, as he is a student of both Sanskrit and Classical Tibetan. He told me an interesting story about a Tibetan professor of his who attributed much of his own success in the language to the habitual use of a Tibetan-Tibetan dictionary. The dictionary essentially functions the same way as Ã˜rberg's glosses: each word is defined by a simple phrase or, for more difficult words, by a group of more familiar synonyms.

I think that a Latin-Latin dictionary would be an incredibly powerful resource, especially if used in conjunction with the Lingua Latina books. I did a few Google and Amazon searches, but I wasn't able to discover if such a resource exists. Has anyone here ever seen or used something like a Latin-Latin dictionary?

I definitely saw a couple Latin-Latin dictionaries (and a bunch of other cool ones) yesterday while poking around in a theological library. I'll report back later when I've written down their info. No telling if Google will have them though.

On that note, it's interesting that a lot of foreign language dictionaries before the 20th century tended to have just Latin translations. Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, Celtic, etc. to Latin. I imagine these have all fallen completely out of use even if they are among the best available in their specific language. What was once done to make something universally readable has now rendered it unintelligible to most. Personally, I look forward to using an Ancient Greek-Latin dictionary to keep up with both of my studies.

So besides Wagner's Lexicon Latinum, my library has Forcellini's Lexicon Totius Latinitatis and the published volumes of the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae. Considering that these latter are multiple large volumes and don't seem to be on Google books, you'd best stick with Wagner for your immediate lexical needs.

The Lexicon Mediae et Infimae Latinitatis by Charles Ducagne is available online and in Latin (along with some French), but it only covers medieval Latin.

bedwere wrote:There is also the Gradus ad Parnassum. One of these days I'm going to upload either the Wagner or the Gradus onto Lulu and print a dictionary for me.

I am about to buy this Thesaurus (for 40 â‚¬). I am not familiar to Thesaurus nor Latin-Latin dictionaries but when I'm writing Latin and I don't find the exact word or a synonym, it could be useful: http://www.iberlibro.com/servlet/BookDe ... D0%26y%3D0By the way, is Lulu expensive?

Gonzalo wrote:I am about to buy this Thesaurus (for 40 â‚¬). I am not familiar to Thesaurus nor Latin-Latin dictionaries but when I'm writing Latin and I don't find the exact word or a synonym, it could be useful: http://www.iberlibro.com/servlet/BookDe ... D0%26y%3D0By the way, is Lulu expensive?

i finally found and bought a (massive) copy of stephanus' thesaurus linguae latinae recently: here are some pics if anyone else likes these kinds of books (remove spaces from the links, textkit is still blocking links to my site):

Gonzalo wrote:I am about to buy this Thesaurus (for 40 â‚¬). I am not familiar to Thesaurus nor Latin-Latin dictionaries but when I'm writing Latin and I don't find the exact word or a synonym, it could be useful: http://www.iberlibro.com/servlet/BookDe ... D0%26y%3D0By the way, is Lulu expensive?

hi, wagner isn't monolingual. it gives french resemblances of latin words, rather than defining latin words in latin (i have had long discussions with classics bookstore owners here about why i think this is necessary: in reading an article on one word you are really learning multiple words by seeing how they go together; bilingual classics dictionaries just show you that X modern word or phrase resembles more or less Y ancient word).

wagner also gives latin synonyms, but just lists them, which isn't v useful because it doesn't explain the different significations of these. far better i think to read books specifically dedicated to latin synonyms or greek synonyms, which take a couple of synonyms at a time and separate out their differences (either differences of meaning or the different contexts in which they are used): if you search archive dot org or google for latin synonyms or greek synonyms you will find some.

i finally found and bought a (massive) copy of stephanus' thesaurus linguae latinae recently: here are some pics if anyone else likes these kinds of books (remove spaces from the links, textkit is still blocking links to my site):

hi, i bought the dict at a rare book store on the left bank in paris, took a while to track it down, v $$.

just to add to what i was saying above, latin comp books also sometimes explain the nuances of synonyms, e.g. if you check out william smith's principia series, vol iv on latin prose comp (it's online), he explains basic differences in synonyms throughout the exercises.

Does anyone know of any online version of Stephanus' Thesaurus Linguae Latinae? From what I've seen it should be the best Laitn-Latin dictionary in existence, but doesn't seem to be anywhere outside of a few, rare libraries.

A link, please ? I checked Google and Google Books, the SULAIR site has some problem finding its own listed pages, and I couldn't find it anywhere else.

There are some scattered volumes on Google books (maybe all?) but here is a downloadable site of all seven:
[url]http://standish.stanford.edu/bin/search/advanced/process?clauseMapped(catKey)=612209&sort=title
[/url]

My mistake, it is the "Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis". And the definitions do seem to be entirely in Laitn.

Last edited by thesaurus on Sun Jul 27, 2008 5:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

greswell states (pg 201) that in his opinion the best edition overall of the latin-latin dict is the london edition of the 1700s, which includes corrections, expansions etc. to the 1543 edition of stephanus (see pg 201 of the book linked above).

I'm doing some reconnaissance at my local library for Stephanus (they have it). Would a photographed edition (high quality) be of any interest to anyone, because I have no place to store it online? Would I be able to Lulu one?

Sidenote: I haven't decided to do it yet... Just checking out the books.

Use a tripod.
Use a Bembo trekker tripod to come in over the books, if you can. (Obviously a copy stand is nice but I have a Kaiser Pro copy stand and actually prefer to use the Bembo.)
Make sure the plane of the camera body is parallel to the book or table surface (using a camera spirit level usually, or else by eyeballing it)
Try to avoid shadows cast on the page by the tripod or by anything else (including you).
Use diffuse or even lighting, to prevent uneven distribution of light across the pages.
Make sure the lighting of the pages is good to ensure best detail contrast. So use some reading lamps if you haven't got shadow boxes, but avoid lighting hotspots by positioning the lamps too close to the pages.
JPEG capture will be fine, as long as you keep it fine or good and not low resolution.
Best to photo double spreads, rather than single pages, for speed, and this requires you checking the detail capture. I've captured double-spreads of A3 dimensions and held resolution on 6-point fonts with a 5 megapixel camera in the past, as long as you are follow these guidelines, but obviously higher megapixel capture is better, although for the Stephanus books 7 to 10 megapixel capture is better.
Use a remote trigger on the camera to prevent shake.
With the camera relatively close to the book, don't underestimate the depth of field required to ensure all points of the page surface are in focus (pages bow).
Keep a high resolution to ensure accurate capture of small point sizes (fonts).
Follow a system of visually and mentally noting each page number to ensure you don't skip a page in a long run (you needn't write it down of course, just keep an eye out for skipping pages, which can often happen).
Remember to photograph the outer covers and spine (it's nice to do so) and even the seemingly unimportant pages (no pages are unimportant).
Try not to damage the spine keeping the book flat, and increase depth of field if you need to, in preference to forcing the book flat.
You need to devise your own method of ensuring pages stay flat when you photograph them and if you suspect they may have moved during the shot, take a second shot â€”much harder to return to this if you hand the books back to the library and then discover some pages have motion blurring.
Photograph at a fine or high resolution and as high as possible colour depth. DO NOT use a low image-capture resolution or or low colour depth (--bit resolution should be at least 8 bit and 24-bit is great). You can always sample down using batch processing in PhotoShop if the total file size is much too high.
If the book has much detail, photograph in colour in preference to grayscale, even if your book is B&W. You will hold a broader tonal range for illustration detail and, importantly, for very fine print (plus it's a more faithful image, anyway).
And I would certainly love to be able to get the copy.

KramerKram wrote:I'm doing some reconnaissance at my local library for Stephanus (they have it). Would a photographed edition (high quality) be of any interest to anyone, because I have no place to store it online? Would I be able to Lulu one?

Sidenote: I haven't decided to do it yet... Just checking out the books.

I would sing your praises to the highest heavens for all eternity if you did this. I've been actively investigating this myself since this thread surfaced, emailing various Jesuits to gain secret permissions etc., but so far nequiquam! I have big dreams for this and similar dictionaries. Please do continue and let us know how it's going. I can't offer technical help, but Adrianus seems to have your back on that one.

Use a tripod.Use a Bembo trekker tripod to come in over the books, if you can. (Obviously a copy stand is nice but I have a Kaiser Pro copy stand and actually prefer to use the Bembo.)Make sure the plane of the camera body is parallel to the book or table surface (using a camera spirit level usually, or else by eyeballing it)Try to avoid shadows cast on the page by the tripod or by anything else (including you).Use diffuse or even lighting, to prevent uneven distribution of light across the pages.Make sure the lighting of the pages is good to ensure best detail contrast. So use some reading lamps if you haven't got shadow boxes, but avoid lighting hotspots by positioning the lamps too close to the pages. JPEG capture will be fine, as long as you keep it fine or good and not low resolution.Best to photo double spreads, rather than single pages, for speed, and this requires you checking the detail capture. I've captured double-spreads of A3 dimensions and held resolution on 6-point fonts with a 5 megapixel camera in the past, as long as you are follow these guidelines, but obviously higher megapixel capture is better, although for the Stephanus books 7 to 10 megapixel capture is better.Use a remote trigger on the camera to prevent shake.With the camera relatively close to the book, don't underestimate the depth of field required to ensure all points of the page surface are in focus (pages bow).Keep a high resolution to ensure accurate capture of small point sizes (fonts).Follow a system of visually and mentally noting each page number to ensure you don't skip a page in a long run (you needn't write it down of course, just keep an eye out for skipping pages, which can often happen).Remember to photograph the outer covers and spine (it's nice to do so) and even the seemingly unimportant pages (no pages are unimportant).Try not to damage the spine keeping the book flat, and increase depth of field if you need to, in preference to forcing the book flat.You need to devise your own method of ensuring pages stay flat when you photograph them and if you suspect they may have moved during the shot, take a second shot â€”much harder to return to this if you hand the books back to the library and then discover some pages have motion blurring.Photograph at a fine or high resolution and as high as possible colour depth. DO NOT use a low image-capture resolution or or low colour depth (--bit resolution should be at least 8 bit and 24-bit is great). You can always sample down using batch processing in PhotoShop if the total file size is much too high.If the book has much detail, photograph in colour in preference to grayscale, even if your book is B&W. You will hold a broader tonal range for illustration detail and, importantly, for very fine print (plus it's a more faithful image, anyway). And I would certainly love to be able to get the copy.

In linguam latinam has res non verto. Nimium est. Me excusas.

Hmm... This may be a bigger task than I am able to take on; I don't have any money to buy equipment. I have a regular tripod and an 8 megapixel camera. Any recommendations for using that sort of equipment and maybe a roll of duct tape?

It's not precisely what you're looking for, but consider "D?oderlein's Handbook of Latin synonymes" -- it has a lot of English, but the synonyms, obviously, are in Latin, and the compiler offers notes on usage, e.g., "abesse denotes absence as a local relation, 'to be away' from a place; but deesse denotes an absence by which a thing is rendered incomplete, and means 'to fail,' 'to be waiting,' in opp. to esse and superesse," with quotations from Classical authors.

But that's the problem Bedwere: a lot of books that are downloadable in the US are not so in the rest of the world...Sometimes proxies help, but in this case, I've got the same problem as Metrodorus has: I can see it is full view, but the proxies I usually use (proxify and youhide) can't download it. Too big, I suppose?

I have acquired on loan the four volumes of Stephanus's Thesaurus Linguae Latinae. This is the London edition of 1740, and all the definitions etc are completely in Latin.

I am currently looking into making digital scans of these volumes as best I can. Hopefully I'll be able to get them all done and up online.

I'm also envisioning creating an online latin-latin dictionary, where you can search for words and bring up their Latin definitions, rather than just single word translations in another language. I think a searchable program like this could really help people develop to thinking in the language and not translating between English etc. It could possibly include other Latin-Latin definitions to incorporate the other dictionaries which have made this effort. Does anyone know the best way to go about developing this? Obviously OCR text is important, followed somehow by dividing them into their entries...

I odered a publicdomainreprints copy of google's scan of the Gradus ad Parnassum - this is an all-latin thesaurus - I have found it really useful when writing. It is not quite a dictionary, but it helps.
If we could locate Comenius' Latino-Latinum students' dictionary dictionary, we will find much of the work has already been done - no point reinventing the wheel.

Your proposal to publish Stephanus's Thesaurus online is in itself a lot of work and not to be underestimated, and what you learn by it will inform your later ambitious choices. The trick is to do that thing first and then reassess your ambitions.

I have taken a different tangled path. I've been doing this (compiling a Latin-Latin dictionary for an Expert System) on and off for the last three years, the first year of which involved checking and editing every entry in Whitaker's Words and adding omissions from L&S & OLD. Still many words are wrong or are missing due to my carelessness or choices. I then wrote software to strip and classify existing and OCR'd wordlists + Latin-English and Latin-Latin works from Microsoft's Archive, Google Books and Early English Books Online and I'm up to 60000 words. That's what I call a bucket approach. My needle and thread approach involves going through those entries and adjusting them to allow them to be used in an Expert System. It has become more a hobby (or a folly?) than a project, because it will take many years to complete this, and, if I change the design significantly, it will mean many more years than I have planned for, because much work will have to be redone. It would be wiser to work cooperatively, but cooperation requires a clear plan, clear goals, reliability and committment (and the avoidance of bluffers).

I forgot to say that Vicipaedia has the best approach, in my opinion, to compiling a Latin-Latin dictionary (not quite there yet, however, in terms of design and usability) with its Victionarium at http://la.wiktionary.org/wiki/Victionarium:Lingua_Latina